Text messages and Trips
by alygator86
Summary: Takes place early season 4, during the S&M. MerDer as usual
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I am owned.

Summary: Takes place early season 4, during the S&M. MerDer as usual

Rating: K+

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Izzie and Meredith were on their way to work together when out of nowhere Izzie said:

"You are so lucky."

"What do you mean?" Meredith asked, confused.

"Derek. He's totally, completely in love with you. You guys break up and he's still here. He's amazing. He loves you so much and he can't leave you. It's a little weird actually. You have a weird relationship…well, non-relationship," Izzie explained.

"Non-relationship, I like that."

"But you shouldn't, Mer! He's McDreamy! Ok so that while McWife thing sucked but you guys got through it. In the end, he picked you and you picked him. You guys love each other. Derek…I don't know him really well but there aren't many guys like him. He believes in true love and soul mates. I mean, wow! Seriously, you guys broke up and he still picks you. You guys could have just had that break up sex and he go out with Sloan to do whatever it is they do to pick up girls. Even with your daddy issues – Thatcher left. Derek seriously can't – true love and soul mates. Maybe someday that will happen - I don't know but…"

They got to work, Meredith thinking about what Izzie said. It was a normal day, nothing too major happened, Lexie dropped a coffee, Cristina assisted in a heart surgery. Callie was in a pretty good mood and Izzie and George were acting a little weird. Overall, a normal day.

Meredith found Derek in his office once all of her interns were on cases.

"So what time do you get off tonight?" she asked.

"Um, actually I have to go to Chicago for a medical conference," he told her, stopping the work he was doing.

"What?" she asked, "a medical conference?"

Derek nodded, "Yeah, the chief wants me to go, its three days and its going to be presenting new neurosurgery techniques."

"Oh," she covered her disappointment, "Well that should be fun."

"We'll see," he gave her the McDreamy smiled, "I leave in a couple hours to pack and my flight is later tonight."

"In that case, do you –" her flirty almost suggestion was cut off by her pager. She looked at it and mumbled about interns, "I'll see you later."

-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

After the crisis was managed, Meredith found Cristina.

"Do you want to go to Joe's tonight?"

"Why?" Cristina asked, "McDreamy have to work late?"

"He has to go to a medical conference in Chicago," Meredith answered.

Cristina snorted, "No broken up sex so you want to go to the bar"

"Is that a yes?"

"You're buying me a drink."

-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

After a few shots for each of them, they were a little tipsy. A quite good looking guy sat down next to Meredith.

"Hi. Can I buy you a drink?" he asked with a charming smile.

Meredith looked at him, "No thanks," she smiled politely.

"Are you sure? I can't buy you just one drink?"

Yeah, but thank you anyway."

Cristina leaned forward to talk to the guy. "My friend here is in a non-relationship with a McDreamy but he's out of town and she won't sleep with anyone else so you can just stop trying now."

The guy, not wanting to understand this non-relationship, moved on to another girl.

Izzie showed up a few hours later and took Cristina home then went home with Meredith.

"So what are you going to do tonight?" Izzie asked, innocently.

"Just sleep," Meredith replied.

-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

Meredith was lying in bed staring at the ceiling. It was 1am which meant it was 11pm in Chicago. She had sobered up and was doing her best not to think about Derek. She wasn't wondering how his flight was, she wasn't wondering if he got there ok. She wasn't thinking about what he was doing right now. She wasn't, except she was. She missed him.

Derek sat on the edge of the bed in his hotel room looking at his phone. He wasn't sure if he should call Meredith or not. He hadn't seen her again after talking to her in his office and he missed her. He didn't know if he was allowed to call her. After another 10 minutes of contemplating he settled on texting her.

Meredith was started out of not thinking about Derek by her phone beeping and vibrating, indicating she had a text message. She opened her phone and saw it was from Derek. She told herself she was not happier now and read.

-Got here ok, the hotel is nice but there are no ferry boats-

She smiled to herself and began texting back.

Derek wasn't expecting a message back but was pleasantly surprised when he got one.

-No ferry boats? What a shame. How will you survive there?-

Derek chuckled to himself and quickly replied:

-It will be hard but I'll make due. I have a think for ferry boats-

He was totally talking about her.

-I know. It's intense, that thing you have for ferryboats-

Meredith knew they were talking about her too.

-Very intense and I'll see the ferry boats when I get home. It's late there. You should get some sleep-

Meredith wondered why everything had to be so complicated. Why couldn't she just…ugh! She looked at her reply screen for a few minutes and typed a response.

Derek finished brushing his teeth when his phone alerted him of a new message.

-I like ferry boats too.-

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So there you have it. I seriously have to stop writing during class and pay attention. But it's an amazing feeling when you can be writing a story during a Spanish grammar lesson in Spanish and still know what the teacher is saying. There's one more chapter for this fic, review and you shall receive.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I need the season 3 soundtrack.

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Meredith was doing charts at the nurses' station when Cristina came up.

"He should be back by now," Meredith said.

"McDreamy? What? Are you two dating again?" Cristina asked.

"No, just…he should be back by now."

"Whatever," Cristina said before ordering her interns around.

Meredith was on her way to scrub in to assist Bailey when she heard two interns talking.

"Did you hear about that huge car accident by the airport?" the first intern asked, "there were no survivors."

"Oh, no! Really?" the second intern replied.

"Yeah."

Meredith suddenly felt panicked – what if Derek was involved? She felt like she had to go out and see for herself or go to an on call room and cry but she couldn't. She had interns and surgery and Bailey was calling her name! With no other choice, she scrubbed in telling herself she was only worried because he was a friend.

As soon as the surgery was finished, one and a half hours later, she scrubbed out as fast as she could and grabbed her phone, starting to text him while walking down the hall. She wasn't watching where she was going and ran into someone.

"I'm sorry," she apologized.

"It's ok."

Meredith looked up and saw it was Derek. It was Derek, oh god! She hit him on the chest, tears coming to her eyes. Derek looked at her, concerned and pulled her into the closest on call room.

"You're late," she told him quietly.

"I know, I overslept and missed my flight so I got a later one. Then, there was a horrible traffic jam because of an accident. I called Richard," he explained.

At the mention of the accident near the airport, she got teary again.

Derek took a couple steps close to her so that he was just an arm's length away.

"Meredith, what's wrong?"

"You're late and you didn't call me and I was scared because I heard some interns talking about that accident and no one survived and I can't lose you," she rambled and at some point the tears began to fall, "but you don't have to call because it's just S&M."

Derek pulled her into a hug. "I should have called. I didn't know you'd worry this much."

"Neither did I," she cried.

Derek held her for a couple minutes, letting her calm down.

"This isn't working, is it?" he asked quietly.

She shook her head against his chest, "Not really."

Derek pulled back slightly to look at her. "Why don't we do a sort of relationship thing?" he suggested, McDreamily.

"What does that mean?" she asked.

"It means," he moved her bangs away from her face, "that we take things slowly, that I don't put any pressure on you unless you are being too avoid-y," he smiled knowingly and she returned a small smile, "that you can tell me things – you can always tell me things. It means that you will see I am not your father and I will never choose anyone else, that I will never walk away."

"You won't tell me to try to get to know Lexie?"

"Nope. So what do you want, Meredith?"

Meredith looked at him wondering if she should say what was on her mind. But if she wanted to be with him that's what she had to do, right?"

Derek kept looking at her with the unintentional McDreamy face while Meredith pondered actually not being with him. Not having him there to make her laugh, to tease her about her snoring, to be proud of her when she succeeds, to boast her accomplishments, for her to be bossy to, to make sure she takes care of herself, to make her talk when she doesn't want to but needs to, to save her when she's drowning – figuratively and literally – to love and to love her for and despite everything that's happened and everything that she is.

"The other day, Izzie said that you can't leave me; like you said, you cant walk away. The thing is…neither can I. I can flight like hell against it but I can't not be with you and I hate you for it. I hate that I love you so much," she smiled, running was easy, running was what she did, but running didn't make her happy, "I want to have a sort of relationship with you. And eventually after that a relationship relationship. I don't know how long I will take to get to that second part but I want to be with you."

With a big smile, Derek leaned in and kissed the woman who stole his heart in a bar. Meredith returned the kiss. Running didn't make her happy but being with Derek sure did and with everything that happened in her life, she deserved some happiness.

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Not the best fic, in my eyes but I'm sure everyone will love it. I always think my fics are crap.

I hope you enjoyed it 


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